1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method of processing an image, and, more particularly, to an apparatus and a method of forming an image by separating color information into a plurality of color information items.
2. Related Art
Hitherto, there has been image processing for reading an original document in which, for example, a red seal impression is made on black characters, performing a color separation operation into red color components and black color components and printing red and black images.
Furthermore, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,931,882 (Takeda et al.), has been suggested the technique, in which the digital optical system erases a latent image formed by the analog optical system, as a printing technique using two colors.
However, in a case where the black image forming process and the red image forming process are performed sequentially, the above-described conventional structure encounters a problem in that the formed image lacks a portion of the seal impression image, which is overlapped with the characters, causing the missing red image portion to become excessively conspicuous. As a result, the quality of the formed image deteriorates excessively.